Donners Bend (35 page)

“I can’t be sure.”

“But if you had to say?”

“Then,”
Ellie
stammered, “T-Then I’d have to say no
. 
No, I don’t love you, Jamie.”

“No,” Jamie repeated solemnly to himself, “No.”

“Please don’t be angry with me Jamie,”
Ellie
begged, “Please let us still be friends.”

Jamie didn’t want to be just friends anymore; he wanted more than that
. 
He’d already embarrassed himself
:
he never expected this response
,
and
he didn’t want to stick around any longer.

Placing back on his fedora, Jamie said monotonously, “I’m sorry,
Ellie
, but I really must be going.”

“Please don’t go, Jamie!”
Ellie
called back
. 
If she could have, she would have chased after him, but in her wheelchair she was con
fined
to only the porch
. 
Whee
li
n
g it to the edge, she called again, “Please don’t be angry, Jamie
! 
Please stay!”

“Goodbye,
Ellie
,” he said with the tip of his hat
, a
nd then he was gone, riding off into the distance and leaving poor confused
Ellie
on the porch.

Jamie felt the cold wind blow past him as he rode through the hills faster than he ever had in his life
. 
Continually, he would kick the horse’s sides and order it to go faster still
. 
Nothing
seemed to matter anymore
. 
He decided that if he fell off and died at that moment
,
it wouldn’t really matter all that much
. 
Ellie
had refused his proposal, and that was all that really counted.

He didn’t want to be one of those men who spend their whole lives chasing after a girl that doesn’t feel the same way
. 
He didn’t want to
have to try and
convince
Ellie
to marry him
. 
He wanted her to have accepted
and be excited about it
on her own will, not with
zealous prodding
. 

So that was the end, he decided
. 
That was the end of him and
Ellie
. 
It
just must not have been meant to be
. 

He couldn’t go home now
. 
He needed time to think
, a
nd so he led the horse toward a different direction, one that led to
Phillip
’s house.

They spent the whole day doing absolutely nothing of importance; it was a day of mourning
.

Back at the
Rhodes
’
house
, no one had any idea where Jamie was or what he’d done that day
. 
Robert
and
Louise
had absolutely no clue that any sort of romance at all had been going on between their oldest son and the nanny, let alone a possible marriage
. 
They didn’t know where he was, but no one was too worried
. 
It wasn’t unlike Jamie to go off for a day to himself every so often.

Finally, after hours of trying to forget about
Ellie
, the subject was no longer susceptible to being hidden
. 

S
o now
Phillip
and Jamie sat exactly where they had that night before: opposite one another on brown leather couches in a dim
ly lit
parlor
. 
Phillip
was completely drunk again, just as he’d been the night before
, but
Jamie, though he’d also had several drinks, wasn’t exactly drunk
. 
He was dazed though: dazed, delirious, and completely confused
. 
This was how
Ellie
had made him.

Although he’d looked so suave and handsome at
Ellie
’s, his appearance had changed quite dramatically since
. 
His jacket had been thro
wn
carelessly onto the floor, his shirt
sleeves
were
rolled up, and his tie loosened
. 
Lying on the sofa, his fedora had been placed onto the top of his face, preventing him from seeing anything except darkness and from anyone seeing him
. 
Only the tips of his dark, dark, almost
-
black hair stuck out from beneath.

Phillip
, opposite him, was dressed more casually in khaki pants and a blue collared shirt
. 
He’d already heard all about what had happened with
Ellie
, and was trying to comfort his friend as best he could.

“She’s a fool, Jame,” he insisted, “A
dang
fool
. 
I
f she was smart she would’ve known how stupid it was to say no.”

“She’s not the fool, I’m the fool,” Jamie replied from beneath the fedora.

“Not yet, you’re not
, but
…
” he paused, “
b
ut if you run after her, then you will be
. 
For you don’t want to end up a man chasing after some hopeless cause, do ya?”

“No,” the hat shook back and forth.

“Good.”

Phillip
really was in quite a difficult position
. 
For I’m sure not many know what it’s like to comfort a good friend when he’s just been refused by the love of his life
. 
Phillip
felt like he needed to do something, anything to help Jamie get over it more quickly
, but
of course it’s also quite hard to think logically when you’re as intoxicated as
Phillip
Browning was.

“
Phillip
?” Jamie asked in a mumble.

“Yeah?”

“What if that was it?”

“What d’ya mean?”

“What if that was my last chance at love
? 
What if that was my last chance at marriage?”

“Aww, come on!”
Phillip
replied doubtfully, “You’re not a bad lookin’ guy and you’re smart
to boot
. 
Plus, you’ve got money enough to provide fer even the most demanding dames I know
. 
No need to worry yet, Jame
. 
You’ve got plenty of time t
a
spare yet.”

As Jamie shook his head, the fedora shook with it from where it sat upon his face, “No
. 
I’m gettin’ old now
. 
In a few weeks I’ll be twenty-five years old, for
goodness
sake.”

“How old’s
Ellie
?”

“Sixteen.”

Phillip
whistled, long and slow, “There aren’t many young girls like her around anymore, are there?”

“Nope.”

“Well, ya know, I’m personally not that worried about finding a girl to marry and all that yet, and I’m only a few months younger than you are,” said
Phillip
, “Maybe finding a girl’s not all that important
. 
I wouldn’t mind living alone and lettin’ my bachelor days live
on
forever.”

“You will mind,” Jamie disagreed, “You will when you’ve grown up a little more.”

“Hey
! 
I’m already more of a man than you’ll ever be,”
Phillip
replied haughtily
. 

Jamie went on, still hidden beneath his fedora, “I can’t live alone
. 
I refuse to.”

“Why not?”

“The way I see it, without a wife and a family and all that, what’s
there to
life
that’s
worth living
? 
I mean really, what would be the worth of it all?” Jamie questioned, but he added, “Of course, I can understand why some men don’t wish for that sorta life, but for me personally, I can’t imagine living without it.”

Phillip
b
link
ed, realizing how much this had really, truly meant to Jamie
. 
Slowly and tentatively, he suggested, “Well, maybe there’s still a chance with
Ellie
. 
You never know.”

“No, no,” the fedora shook again, “She meant what she said and she’s not gonna change her mind
. 
I could just tell, ya know
? 
I could just tell by what she said and the way she said it that her mind was made up
. 
There’s not gonna be a second chance
. 
That was it
. 
It’s done
. 
It’s over.”

“Don’t worry
. 
It’ll be hard, and it may take a while, but someday you’ll be able to forget her
. 
Someday you will.”

Jamie made no reply and the room was silent
. 
Phillip
shifted rather uneasily on the sofa and propped a pillow up behind his head
. 
The solitude was finally broken when
Phillip
said, “You’ll just have to find some way to make that time go more quickly.”

Once again, Jamie didn’t respond
. 
Silence reigned once more until suddenly, without any warning, the pillow fell off
Phillip
’s couch as he sat up abruptly with his eyes wide.

“
Well,
I think I’ve got something!” he exclaimed.

“Got what?” c
ame Jamie’s reply, muffled by his hat.

“All you have to do is find another girl
! 
It can’t be too hard
, a
nd once you have
,
Ellie
will instantly be swept from your mind again.”

“But there are no other girls, you said so yourself.”

“Just one girl,”
Phillip
replied slowly, thinking, “One kind, yet young girl for Ol’ Jamie boy to marry.”

“There’s not one,
Phillip
, I’m
telling
ya.”

Suddenly, there was an
outburst as
Phillip
suddenly reme
mbered someone, “Sarah
Walsh!”

Jamie spasmodically sat up as well
,
and the fedora fell to the floor
.
“
Sarah
Walsh?”

Phillip
nodded, “That’s it
! 
Ol’
Sarah
. 
She’s been crazy ‘bout you since
…
” he chuckled, “
… s
ince I don’t know when
. 
If you ask her,
she’s sure to answer yes
. 
It’s practically a fact
. 
She’s crazy ‘bout ya
! 
And she always will be
,
too!”